The Adventures of a Three-Guinea Watch Part 45

"Arrah! Downie, darlint, ye may put on your coat, because I forgive you this onst; but, man dear, don't do it again!" and was thereby considered by everybody to have had the best of the whole adventure.

Under such dignified circ.u.mstances did we set foot on Indian soil.

The reader will be surprised that I have never yet remembered that when I last heard of him, Charlie, my first master, was in India. I did remember it often and often--during the voyage and after landing. And yet I quite despised myself for imagining (as I did) that the next white face I saw would surely be his. India is a big place--a dreadfully big place--and the chances of finding any one particular person there are about as great as of discovering a needle in a haystack. He might have left India long ago; he might have fallen in the ma.s.sacres of the past few months; he might be somewhere right across the continent. And so, though I could not get rid of a vague sort of expectation, during the first few days of my being in India, I always laughed at myself for a simpleton for thinking such a chance possible.

However, we had no time for thinking just then. From the moment we landed in Bombay, and for a week or two afterwards, we were continually on the move. Long forced marches under a broiling sun, it was enough to wear out any ordinary troops. But our men, and the column to which they were now attached, formed no ordinary body of men. They were Englishmen hastening to the rescue, and nothing on earth could stop them. It was strange how slowly the news of those stirring times came to our ears.

One day we heard with a horror that I can never describe of that foul ma.s.sacre at Cawnpore, where in cold blood gentle English ladies and innocent children had been brutally ma.s.sacred, and their bodies flung into a well. Then the news came of the achievements of that wonderful army of relief led by Havelock.

Day after day came the news of his march on Lucknow, where our besieged fellow-countrymen lay. Every one knows of that heroic march. Inch by inch, almost, that handful of men fought their way, fighting a battle a day, and never yielding a step.

One day a horseman galloped into our camp in a great state of excitement. As he flung himself from his horse he shouted something, but we only caught the two words, "Havelock," "Lucknow." It was enough.

Lucknow was saved! There rose cheer upon cheer at the news, and shout upon shout. Men and officers alike waved their hats and shook hands, Paddy, as usual, let his feelings get the better of him, and nearly broke Larry's spine with the joyful thump he gave it; indeed, it is safe to say our men were almost as proud as if they had themselves achieved the relief.

Presently, however, there spread a rumour that though Lucknow was saved, it was not yet relieved.

Havelock had fought his way in, but until help arrived, he, too, would be a prisoner within its walls; and almost in the same breath came the grand news; our column was the one destined for this glorious work! How our hearts beat! What mattered it now how long the marches were, and how grilling the sun?

"Lucknow" was the cry; and that magic word sustained us in every hards.h.i.+p and peril.

We reached Cawnpore at last, and there joined Sir Colin Campbell's force. The sight of this house of murder was simply maddening to the men. They left the place next morning with a sort of shudder, and set their faces towards Lucknow. It was not till we were well on the march that I had leisure to look about me and notice how our force was increased.

Several now regiments were with us, and the commander-in-chief and his staff and heavy guns and siege trains accompanied the march. With the exception of a few skirmishes, my master had yet to learn what a battle was. We crept on, halting sometimes, and sometimes pus.h.i.+ng on, until one jubilant afternoon the distant walls of Lucknow appeared in sight.

Then indeed our brave fellows began to breathe again.

To-morrow would bring them to the city walls, and--what was equally after their hearts--face to face with the enemy. We bivouacked here for the night.

Now it happened on this particular night that my master was on sentinel duty for the first time in his life, and mightily proud of his charge.

There he stood as stiff as a poker, with his rifle at his side, and I verily believe would have thought nothing of running his bayonet through the body of the commander-in-chief if he had presented himself without the pa.s.sword.

Patrick was not a dreamer; and as he looked across in the direction of Lucknow I don't suppose his meditations were of the loftiest kind. He knew there would be a fight to-morrow, and so he was happy; he knew duty might call him to action even to-night, and so he kept a very sharp look-out at his post; but otherwise his mind was profoundly untroubled.

It was not so with me. On the eve of the battle I could not but feel that in a few hours I might be ownerless, and in a dead man's pocket; and, as I looked back upon my strangely eventful life, I sighed, and half hoped, if he were slain, they would in mercy bury me with him, and so end my cares once and for all. Little I knew!

It was scarcely ten o'clock when Paddy was startled by approaching footsteps. They belonged to an officer of our force who was returning at this hour from an outpost. Paddy eyed him suspiciously, and even when he gave the word looked disappointed at not having the privilege of using his bayonet upon him. Just as he was going on his way, the officer turned and said, in a voice which startled me,--

"Is it ten yet, my man?"

Why did the voice startle me? I could not see the speaker's face, but as he spoke I fancied myself back in the Randlebury schoolroom, and my memory saw a bright-eyed boy I had known once whom I could almost have believed to be the speaker of these few words. Strange what fancies take possession of one! Patrick, as he _had_ a watch, and had by this time learned the mysterious art of telling the time, was not the man to answer such a question as this at random.

"Hould my gun, cap'n," he said, "till I sthrike a light."

Fancy a sentinel asking an officer to hold his gun! I knew enough of military discipline to make me tremble at the thought of what would become of my unceremonious master.

But the officer, instead of flying into a rage, took the rifle and laughed. That laugh reminded me more than ever of Randlebury.

"You're a pretty fellow," he said. "Is that the manners they teach you at home."

"I axe yer pardon, colonel, but--"

Here the officer laughed again--and oh! how my heart beat as I heard him. "If I stay here much longer I shall get promoted to general, I suppose," said he. "Look sharp and tell me the time."

Patrick, without another word, produced a light. The officer's face was half turned as he did so, and I could not catch his features, but as he turned impatiently towards the sentinel the light fell full upon it, and with a bound of astonishment I recognised in the swarthy, soldierly officer before me, no other than my oldest and dearest master, Charlie Newcome, of Randlebury.

The strange presentiment, then, was true--I had found him after so long a time! But what if he should not see me? What torment to be so near and yet so far! And how was it likely he would take notice of a common private's watch, and if he did, how was it likely at this distance of time he would remember poor me? Jim, I know, had told him of the strange way in which I had come into his hands, and would certainly have also told him about losing me. He must, therefore, long ago have given up all thoughts about me, or if he ever remembered me it would be as one dead.

My master took me out and held me up to the light.

"It'll be about five minutes past ten, your honour, by my watch."

"Thank you. Good--hullo?"

He had seen me! His eyes were suddenly riveted upon me, and he seemed glued to the spot where he stood.

"Did your honour plaze to spake?" asked Paddy, proceeding to put me back into his pocket.

"My old watch!" cried Charlie, springing forward, and catching hold of my master's hand. "Give it to me!"

Paddy's surprise was unbounded. At first he deemed the man mad, then drunk, then gradually it dawned upon him this was not an officer at all, but a highwayman in disguise, seeking to take advantage of his solitude to rob him.

In an instant he sprang back, and, seizing his rifle, levelled the bayonet to within an inch of Charlie's heart.

"Now, ye thievin' blackguard," said he, "move an inch and I'll stick ye like a pig. Arrah! but ye came to the wrong boy when ye thought to play your tricks on me! Stan' still now, or as sure as you're alive you're a dead man;" and he gave Charlie a suggestive touch with the point of his weapon, which showed plainly he had every intention of being as good as his word.

Here was a predicament! and I could do nothing to help.

Charlie, fairly penned in a corner, was at a loss what to say or do. He began in an angry strain,--

"Don't be a fool, sir; do you--"

"Howld yer tongue!" roared Paddy, giving another poke with his bayonet.

Then Charlie attempted to laugh, which enraged the sentry all the more.

"Is it mock me, ye would, as well as rob me, ye foul-mouthed spalpeen, you?" he cried.

"I don't want to rob you," put in Charlie.

"Faith and I'll see ye don't," retorted the Irishman.

"Listen to me an instant," besought Charlie.

"The sorra a word. Ye shall say it all before the gineral the morrow, for there I'll take ye."

For some moments Charlie stood in this awkward fix, not daring to stir, or even to speak, and with every prospect of spending the night with a bayonet point within an inch of his body.

Suddenly, however, a brilliant idea occurred to him. If I really was his old watch, as he fancied, this man had possibly found me where Halliday had lost me.

It was a bare chance every way, but he determined to try it.